yadda, yadda,
and blah de blah ... CRO....
Think of digital marketing acronyms as your code to tune-in and analyse or tune-in and contribute to those sometimes lengthy reviews, de-briefs and kick-offs.
In terms of the acronym – there are so many terms – and used by preference by many, due to the fact that they allow a much more efficient and speedier conversation to deliver and discuss plans and digital marketing reports. However, beware of
This feature works best on desktop – however, some phones handle the scrip well.
Hover on the cloud and click for the marketing term and definition.
CTR and CRO
Two of the most insightful acronyms of your digital marketing.
CTR is the Click through rate – how many of the viewed links, posts, results were clicked through.
CRO is Conversion Rate Optimisation – this is the process of turning traffic into customers, mostly applicable to the process of analysing user journeys and client behaviours to enhance their experience whilst on the website, it can also be applied to posts and social activities.
As a freelance digital marketing consultant I would suggest it is these two combined statistics that will determine whether your strategy is being successfully applied to your marketing campaigns.
These two often appear together and while they both relate to improving your web visitors experiences on your website, they are actually referring to entirely different skillsets.
UX is the technical side – it is the function and interaction elements – in plain English it is the practicality and performance and far from being boring and practical is actually where the magic can happen – think performance sports car engine ‘X’.
UI on the other hand is more the design elements, the look and feel of the elements that make-up your site or app, this is just as important and, largely, without it, even if you have the best features only a certain few will interact with it and this, will only be when they are actively looking. Think of UI as the sports car interior – does it have cheap feeling plastic-like buttons or the finest detailing, with reassuring positioning, section clicks and confirmations.
Everyone knows how important SEO is – how many actually know what it is and how to do it – remains debatable – the fact is a current website requiring traction online – can’t live without it.
Essentially it is the processes of making your website good – technically – to include speed of page loading, structured properly and logically and providing content that is well written, and provides value – whether this be through the provision of products and supporting information or a knowledgeable and extensive resource and topic area. The actual elements of SEO are so extensive that it would be unwise to try and cover it all in this description. The acronym of SEO stands for search engine optimisation and essentially is – how you portray your site as worthy of listing above your competition for specific topics/keywords.
Search Engine Marketing, essentially your digital marketing plans, goals, objectives and strategies. SEM strategies tend to assume you have your technical elements saquared off and focus more toward content marketing, guest posting and outreach as well as on page SEO.
Pay per click, an ever increasingly competitive marketplace where you can bid and pay for search traffic based on your keywords – these can grouped into broadmatch, exactmatch or phrase and can also allow you to specify negatives. The management of ppc is becoming increasingly costly and the value of the top terms in commercial worlds are calling for a much more strategic and clever approach to get into the top positions.
If you are looking for crisis management for Google Ads I can provide various services on a project or retained basis.
Googles’ suite of tools is ever expanding however, the absolute must-know of the tools are Google Analytics, Google Search Console and Google Tag Manager.
All provided free of charge – your website can’t really survive without it and will require a person/persons of skill to get the most out of it.
Google Analytics – is the code that you place in your website to obtain information on the behaviours and acquisition of the traffic received. This is in the process of migrating from UA to GA4 and signifies a change from session and cookie-based reporting metrics to event-based or website action reporting.
GSC – search console is more specific information on the keywords and landing pages of the site, so essential for monitoring the performance of your content marketing and organic successes.
GTM – google Tag Manager, provides further tools to allow you to monitor and measure your traffic, you can add custom html or java tags as well as an ever growing list of tag templates available via their library.
The range of Google courses available are extensive and you may like to check-out this link to Google tools libraries and certifications.
CPC is an indicator of the price you pay per click, and it is useful to compare these figures when you need to bid aggressively to get to the top on terms that are competitive – is it, for example false economy to bid to be in position 10 as opposed to 2 or three – I would encourage you to take a look to assess the quality of traffic obtained, especially in those positions outside of the top 5 results.
Quality of Traffic? Quality Traffic is highly profiled, genuine and targeted traffic that does spend time on your site, engages with your content and provides opportunity for conversion.
CPA is a great indicator of your marketing and can be calculated on all your marketing efforts and campaigns – not just PPC. Acquisition normally refers to a sign-up, sale or booking and is qualified by the fact that they are a new customer. Simply divide the total cost of the Keyword or campaign and divide by the number of customers obtained through the activity.
Content that is created by your user is referred to as User Generated Content. This is important to build trust, and allows a client perspective to come through.
There are many theories as to the best place to position UGC, however, it is important to keep in mind that it should not hinder the flow or logical behaviours that a new user will want to go through.
In terms of analysing the best position it should be possible to gain important insight from the behaviours of your existing traffic and thus genuinely connect this UGC with your existing content and pre-sales touch points or demos.
Usually in the form of a button online – it can be a simple – sign-up here or Download Now or Get 50% off.
What is a CTA?
A CTA is a call to action, a prominent and well placed prompt for the user to interact and or obtain a special offer or resource. It can be within a digital advert or online.
The correct placement and intent of a CTA is so vitally important and I would suggest it to be the singlemost important factor in generating conversions that actually result in a booking. It is the essential element to growth marketing, B2C and B2B marketing it is the thing that ties together your marketing strategy whether it be omnichannel or niche campaign.
The purpose of this is to create sales leads – hence the term, quite often they will refer to subscriptions, downloads, or white-papers. They are a useful inclusion, not only on your site but also as posts in social media. A lead magnet would, for example have its own CTA or combine to make the CTA more desirable.
This refers to the need to create a logical flow from interest through to sign-up, purchase or action.
The problem I have with the word funnel and the model and diagrams in general, is that they infer a forced funnel and therefore a restriction of choice. It is true that the process requires some understanding of the user journey, however, not everyone responds well to a forced ‘funnel’ feed of information. Ikea shoppers, for example, have shown a loyalty to the store format of conveyor belt type shopping, however, if you are a niche or bespoke product – beware of the funnel model and learn about your users. Opt instead to provide flexibility and perhaps opt for interactive forms such as those used by car specification sites, custom made –
means custom made.
Above the Line – refers to, broadly speaking, brand building exercises, and can, be thought of as display advertising, things such as radio, outdoor media and some forms of online display advertising can all be termed as ATL activity.
Below the line refers to activities that are more one-to based, this very much encompasses direct response, lead generation and PPC type campaigns.
TTL is an integrated approach which is creating a journey from brand awareness right through to conversion.
Evergreen is a term that refers to types of content – think of it as classical style – it never goes out of fashion – for example if you were writing a feature on clothing – the title of ‘Fashion Houses of the 90s’ the content would be relevant, in this instance, to a niche market and could be posted regularly via a range of social media channels for an almost timeless period.
If however, you were to write about the Spring/Summer trends hitting the New York Fashion Show – it would have a huge topical value only at the time of its showing (September time) it could also have some evergreen value with updates and revisions and careful re-titling or editorial addition.
If however you were to write about the best Spring bracelets available to buy online, you will only have a limited time that the links and value are of interest and therefore is time sensitive in its distribution, due to relevance for the target audience. The latter, is therefore a time-sensitive and topical piece without longevity, although it is still possible to ‘recycle content’ that is not evergreen.
The fictitious picture, is built on real insights of your own customers or target market.
The data serves to represent the demographic and type of person, the work they do, their interests and their motivations, and what social accounts and topics they are likely to follow and interact with.
Refers to a plan of connected, different activities, that has the purpose of achieving strategised goals. For example, you may run a series of campaigns for different end users, providing clear and instant messaging to engage with a very specific and niche audience. The end goal however, would be to grow new business and to highlight the reasons or specific elements of the business product that are of particular relevance to the end user. This may have several strategies attached to it.
A campaign can utilise a number of formats and is not restricted to marketing and advertising efforts – you may for example run workshops, demonstrations and content within your campaign, however, the key is ensuring that you allow and schedule the appropriate amount of time to campaign planning, it is essential to ensure each campaign is cohesive within the overall plan and delivery.
What you see is what you get. This is becoming an increasingly large part of digital.
It is a ‘point and click’ system which, for example, allows you build reports based on various data selections, made visually accessible by selecting the icons of the products available through the widely recognised companies of large data collectors – google analytics for example.
It also refers to the CMS and design systems that allows digital designs to be edited via a visual interface, that appear to the editor as they would when published – as opposed to editing and writing code.
Finally and deliberately not included in the word cloud we have the sales qualification/pipeline acronyms that served us so well, for so many years.
Both of these are generally thought of today, as slightly out of date and you will find many alternative suggestions offered by many different organisations and resources.
The point is, they serve a purpose – relate to your audience – spend time understanding where they are at in their process of ‘deciding to purchase’ and relate to them accordingly, and most interestingly – ‘if your product or service is appropriate to them.’ Wise words.
Freelance Services –
I hope this page provides you with a clear and hopefully engaging format in which to brush-up on some of the main acronyms – the problem of course with acronyms, is that they don’t necessarily translate well globally, but for getting to the point and quickly, they serve a very useful purpose when conversing with your local or in-house teams.
If you are contemplating hiring a marketing professional or are thinking about a freelancer for your marketing activities – I would urge you to take a look at the budget planner. The plans are all built bespoke to your needs and are designed to be affordable for businesses large and small, start-ups or established companies with in-house teams. I have worked for more than 20 years in spaces of advertising, marketing, digital development and project management and have a portfolio of works that spans the small business, agencies and global enterprise.
The SEO button here will provide a simple guideline of the costs associated with your SEO delivery plans and Audits.
My particular strengths are in areas of campaign, strategy and ideation. I have extensive experience working across a range of business sectors, however, I have particular experience in areas of sustainability, property, lifestyle and areas of finance and engineering. I am therefore skilled in co-ordinating digital projects that require the input from teams of specialists and am also independently able to deliver across a broad spectrum of specialist digital services.